Generally when you have a low end machine you try to squeeze every ounce of blood out of it's hardware with software tweaks. Morrowind can be heavily tweaked for performance and image quality through it's configuration file, Morrowind.ini. I have a low end machine, but even if you have a high end machine you can still benefit from this tweak guide. Every cpu cycle you can squeeze will make your Morrowind experience smoother, richer and more stable. Generally I post this in individual threads when needed, but I thought that everyone should at least expirement with this to see if any benefits are drawn from it. (it seemed to have helped those that I presented the guide to in the past)

First you need to locate your Morrowind.ini. It's in the root Morrowind folder (example: "C:\Program Files\Morrowind\". For basic users just right click your Morrowind start menu/desktop shortcut and selcet properties. Open the "Shortcut" tab and press the "Find Shortcut" button. Here you will find your Morrowind.ini. It's the yelllow & white text file.

Now you need to backup the ini (just in case). Copy it somewhere you'll remember. Now double click to open (the origonal ini file). Now follow my instructions below by replacing current values with the recommended ones.

I got a tolerable frame rate with these tweaks on my lousy system (24 fps in Balmora), so for sure they must help out slightly better PCs.

NOTE: Before you complain about no framerate difference being seen I shall and will assume your Operating System has all useless background services and start-up items off or disabled.

[General]

Show FPS=0 ~Setting this to 1 will result in seeing the current frame rate at the bottom right of your screen while runnig Morrowind.

Max FPS=240 ~This is the max amount of frames per second that Morrowind will attempt to render. It's recommended that you set this to either 20 (consistant FPS), 30 (good FPS) or 60 (smooth FPS). Anything higher than 60 would be a waste of CPU and GPU resources as the human eye will barely notice the difference in frame rate.

TryArchiveFirst=0 ~If you don't have any mods installed set this to 1 as it will make Morrowind use only the default data in the Morrowind.bsa. 1 will result in the best performance. Set it to 0 if you use mods and set it to -1 if you are trying to make a Morrowind Total Conversion mod.

SkipProgramFlows=0 ~Set this to 1 to gain a slight performance boost

DontThreadLoad=1 ~Set this to 1 to not load cells (game areas) in multiple process threads. Setting it to 1 will increase performance at the cost of longer loading times.

NOTE: May cause sound problems on some cards and/or systems . I've had this issue with my SB Ensoniq 5880 (SB16). Adjusting PCI latency settings or toggling threadloading can remedy this issue. If you choose to have threadloading off it is best to disable multithread DX calls in Timeslip's MGE.

ThreadPriority=-1 ~Just set this to 1. When using thread loading setting this to 1 will result in a performance boost.

ThreadSleepTime=4 ~Do not modify this.

Clip One To One Float=1 ~Do not modify this.

Flip Control Y=0 ~Setting this to 1 will result in the mouse looking down while looking up. Inversed mouse looking basically.

Subtitles=0 ~Set to 1 to see subtitles of NPCs speaking. Set to 0 for a slight performance boost.

ShowHitFader=1 ~Set to 1 to see the red "blood shadow" when recieving physical damage in Morrowind combat. Set to 0 for a performance boost. To completly disable it you must disable lockable backbuffers in MGE 3 GUI

Werewolf FOV=100 ~Do not modify this. Unless you like a different field of vision.

[LightAttenuation]

UseConstant=0 ~Do not modify this.

ConstantValue=0.0 ~Do not modify this.

UseLinear=1 ~Set this to 0 then read ahead.

LinearMethod=1 ~Do not modify this.

LinearValue=3.0 ~Do not modify this.

LinearRadiusMult=1.0 ~Do not modify this.

UseQuadratic=0 ~Set this to 1 to use quad lighting which is faster and more 'alive' than linear lighting.

I got a tolerable frame rate with these tweaks on my lousy system (24 fps in Balmora), so for sure they must help out slightly better PCs.

NOTE: Before you complain about no framerate difference being seen I shall and will assume your Operating System has all useless background services and start-up items off or disabled.

[General]

Show FPS=0 ~Setting this to 1 will result in seeing the current frame rate at the bottom right of your screen while runnig Morrowind.

Max FPS=240 ~This is the max amount of frames per second that Morrowind will attempt to render. It's recommended that you set this to either 20 (consistant FPS), 30 (good FPS) or 60 (smooth FPS). Anything higher than 60 would be a waste of CPU and GPU resources as the human eye will barely notice the difference in frame rate.

TryArchiveFirst=0 ~If you don't have any mods installed set this to 1 as it will make Morrowind use only the default data in the Morrowind.bsa. 1 will result in the best performance. Set it to 0 if you use mods and set it to -1 if you are trying to make a Morrowind Total Conversion mod.

SkipProgramFlows=0 ~Set this to 1 to gain a slight performance boost

DontThreadLoad=1 ~Set this to 1 to not load cells (game areas) in multiple process threads. Setting it to 1 will increase performance at the cost of longer loading times.

NOTE: May cause sound problems on some cards and/or systems . I've had this issue with my SB Ensoniq 5880 (SB16). Adjusting PCI latency settings or toggling threadloading can remedy this issue. If you choose to have threadloading off it is best to disable multithread DX calls in Timeslip's MGE.

ThreadPriority=-1 ~Just set this to 1. When using thread loading setting this to 1 will result in a performance boost.

ThreadSleepTime=4 ~Do not modify this.

Clip One To One Float=1 ~Do not modify this.

Flip Control Y=0 ~Setting this to 1 will result in the mouse looking down while looking up. Inversed mouse looking basically.

Subtitles=0 ~Set to 1 to see subtitles of NPCs speaking. Set to 0 for a slight performance boost.

ShowHitFader=1 ~Set to 1 to see the red "blood shadow" when recieving physical damage in Morrowind combat. Set to 0 for a performance boost. To completly disable it you must disable lockable backbuffers in MGE 3 GUI

Werewolf FOV=100 ~Do not modify this. Unless you like a different field of vision.

[LightAttenuation]

UseConstant=0 ~Do not modify this.

ConstantValue=0.0 ~Do not modify this.

UseLinear=1 ~Set this to 0 then read ahead.

LinearMethod=1 ~Do not modify this.

LinearValue=3.0 ~Do not modify this.

LinearRadiusMult=1.0 ~Do not modify this.

UseQuadratic=0 ~Set this to 1 to use quad lighting which is faster and more 'alive' than linear lighting.